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Overall Trends

The final RAJAR release of 2025 has just been published. Overall listening is down a bit this quarter, although All Radio listening has maintained a billion hours. But listening is down 0.7% on the quarter and down 1.8% on the year to 1.014 billion hours.

BBC Radio has done decently against that background on the quarter, although less well on the year. Reach was down 0.1% on the quarter and down 2.5% on the year to 30.9m listeners a week. Hours rose 1.9% on the quarter, but were down 4.8% on the year to 434m hours a week. That’s actually a surprising amount of variability across the year.

The average BBC Radio listener now listens for 14.1 hours a week (or two hours a day). And 53% of the adult population listens to at least one BBC Radio service across the week.

Over in the Commercial Radio camp, reach was down 0.7% on the quarter and down 1.3% on the year to 39.4m. Commercial Radio maintains its lead over the BBC. 68% of the population listen to at least one Commercial Radio service each week.

Hours were down 2.0% on the quarter, but up 0.7% on the year to 560m hours a week.

That means that overall Commercial Radio has a 55% share of listening compared with the BBC’s 43%. The missing 2% being “other” non-measured radio listening.

One technical thing to note is that a growing proportion of radio stations and groups in the UK now report on a half-yearly sample. In other words, the data is based around a rolling six month sample, meaning that the data isn’t just September to December, but July to December. There are still commercial stations reporting quarterly, but many of the bigger ones now report half-yearly. Of the national stations it’s mostly the BBC national stations are truly reflective of the calendar quarter now, and that should be born in mind a bit when you’re thinking about what programming impacted on listening. Going to half-yearly reporting can “flatten” the data a little. A downward trend is still a downward trend, but “rogue” quarters tend to be less likely. With stations that report quarterly, that can still happen. Of course, stations with larger listenerships (e.g. Radio 2) should have vastly large enough samples to ensure that their figures are reliable.

National Networks

Let’s start with BBC Radio 4 for a change, and they’ve had a good quarter-on-quarter. Reach was up 0.7% on the quarter, although down 1.3% on the year to 8.9m. Hours were up 3.2% on the quarter, but down 6.1% on the year to 105m.

I don’t often get into it these days, but it’s worth noting that Radio 4 Extra had some good figures this quarter too, with reach up 3.6% on the quarter and up 4.6% on the year to 1.5m. Hours were up 13.4% on the quarter, but down 9.0% on the year to 11.2m.

Over on BBC Radio 5 Live, reach was down 2.3% on the quarter and down 1.0% on the year to 5.3m. On the other hand, hours were up 4.2% on the quarter and up 7.8% on the year. The station’s new Premier League package began this season, and they have around 209 live fixtures a season (compared with talkSport’s 111) which may be contributing some of those hours. Both stations have more football than previously. 5 Live’s breakfast show did well this quarter, up 16.2% on the quarter and up 5.3% on the year to 1.5m. Hours at breakfast were up 24.5% on the quarter and up 9.1% on the year as well, so that programme is driving some of those hours.

BBC Radio 1 saw its reach fall 3.2% on the quarter, and fall 6.1% on the year to 7.1m. Hours were down 1.2% on the quarter and 10.4% on the year to 45.6m. Unquestionably a disappointing quarter for the station.

Mixed results at BBC Radio 2 with reach down 0.6% on the quarter and down 6.9% on the year to 12.7m. But hours were up 5.6% on the quarter, although down 5.3% on the year to 140.2m.

There were some good quarterly results for BBC Radio 3 with reach up 5.9% on the quarter, but down 2.0% on the year to 1.9m. Hours were up 3.6% on the quarter, but down 2.8% on the year to 14.3m.

BBC6 Music saw some big falls this quarter, with reach down 12.4% on the quarter and down 13.7% on the year to 2.4m. Hours were down 12.4% on the quarter and down 9.6% on the year to 23.3m. This has the feel of a bit of an outlier quarter, but we’ll have to see what happens next time around. The BBC has just announced that 6Music will be the next station getting a BBC Sounds spin-off indie music service. This isn’t planned to be on DAB right now, and the BBC has to jump through much bigger hurdles to get services on DAB compared with commercial operators. But these kinds of spin-offs are relatively cheap to put together and can be hours drivers in the longer term, hence a brand like Heart having no fewer than eight spin-off stations currently!

BBC World Service saw some falls this quarter, with reach down 7.7% on the quarter and down 14.9% on the year to 1.0m. Hours were down 14.9% on the quarter and down 7.5% on the year to 4.6m.

Classic FM saw some small declines with reach down 1.2% on the quarter and down 5.9% on the year to 4.2m. Hours were down 1.6% on the quarter and down 1.3% on the year to 34.3m.

talkSPORT had some good results this quarter, with reach up 2.5% on the quarter, although down 0.5% on the year to 3.2m. Hours were up 2.8% on the quarter and up 13.5% on the year to 22.7m.

Virgin Radio has just made some quite significant scheduling changes which began at the start of the year. These results represent the station’s output prior to this change. Reach was down 13.1% on the quarter and down 20.8% on the year to 1.1m. Hours were down 5.5% on the quarter and down 19.1% on the year.

Meanwhile Times Radio saw its reach fall 3.9% on the quarter and decline 10.3% on the year to 542,000. Hours were down 7.4% on the quarter and were down 0.1% on the year to 4.4m. The station seems to be leaning more heavily into podcasts now, which of course don’t show up in the RAJAR results, so it’ll be interesting to see how it develops its offering over time.

LBC (UK) had a strong quarter with reach up 5.1% on the quarter and up 3.2% on the year. Hours were up 1.9% on the quarter, but down 8.0% on the year to 27.5m.

GB News has strong year on year figures even if it’s down this quarter. Reach was down 1.8% on the quarter but up 43.6% on the year to 672,000. Hours were down 4.4% on the quarter but up 33.5% on the year to 4.6m.

I was curious to see what the overlap is between some of these speech stations. LBC is vastly bigger than stations like Times Radio, Talk or GB News, with 2.8m listeners. Only 100,000 of those listeners also listen to GB News. That means that 3.6% of LBC listeners also listen to GB News, but 14.7% of GB News listeners also listen to LBC.

While GB News and Times Radio are quite close in size with 677,000 and 542,000 listeners respectively (with 6 month weighting), only 22,000 people listen to both. On the other hand, 94,000 of Talk’s 565,000 audience also listen to GB News.

And 80,000 LBC listeners also listen to Times Radio.

Again, using 6 month weighting, 225,000 Times Radio listeners also listen to Radio 4, representing 42% of the station’s audience. That’s a considerable crossover between speech stations.

Finally, Boom Radio is celebrating its fifth birthday this week. It’s reach fell 2.9% on the quarter and was down 0.9% on the year to 692,000. Hours were down 10.9% on the quarter and up 19.3% on the year to 9.2m. Listeners remain incredibly loyal to the station listening for an average of 13.3 hours a week, more than any other national station.

Commercial Networks

Total Global Radio (UK) saw its reach fall very slightly 0.1% on the quarter, and decline 1.3% on the year to 27.5m. Hours were better, up 1.6% on the quarter and up 3.7% on the year to 263m.

The Heart Network (UK) definitely helped drive those increased hours. Reach was up 1.3% on the quarter, but down 5.7% on the year to 9.5m. However, hours were up 3.8% on the quarter and up 5.5% on the year to 61.6m.

Across the entire Heart Brand (UK), reach was down 0.6% on the quarter and down 4.4% on the year to 12.7m. But hours grew – up 1.3% on the quarter and up 2.2% on the year to 83.5m.

Capital Network (UK) saw falls in reach – down 2.0% on the quarter and down 7.6% on the year to 6.9m. Hours were up 1.9% on the quarter and down 1.1% on the year to 37.1m.

Hours were better across the entire Capital Brand (UK) with reach still down 1.5% on the quarter and down 4.5% on the year to 9.2m. But hours were up 3.0% on the quarter and up 5.4% on the year to 54.2m.

The Smooth Radio Network (UK) saw declines this quarter, with reach down 1.5% on the quarter and down 10.9% on the year to 5.9m. Hours were down 6.3% on the quarter and down 6.8% on the year to 39.0m. The Smooth Brand (UK) similarly saw reach down 2.0% on the quarter and down 4.5% on the year to 7.5m. Hours fell 3.9% on the quarter, but were up 2.7% on the year to 50.5m.

There were hours gains on Radio X Network (UK) with reach down 2.7% on the quarter and down 7.4% on the year to 2.0m, but with hours up 3.8% on the quarter and up 4.3% on the year to 17.2m. The Radio X Brand (UK) also saw reach down 2.9% on the quarter, but up 1.7% on the year to 2.5m. Hours were up 2.7% on the quarter and up 10.8% on the year to 20.0m.

I think the big news from Global this quarter has been its ambitions in the podcasting space. They acquired a majority stake in The Overlap, the sports podcasting group in January, having also bought The Fellas Studios back in October last year. These acquisitions, alongside some of their existing successful titles like The News Agents show significant investment in the format.

Meanwhile Bauer Media Audio (UK) – Total (exc Partners) saw its reach fall 1.8% on the quarter and it was down 3.9% on the year to 21.0m. Hours were down 1.7% on the quarter and down 1.1% on the year to 196m.

Greatest Hits Radio has had a second consecutive poor quarter, with reach down 5.1% on the quarter and down 19.8% on the year to 5.9m. Hours were also down 3.1% on the quarter and down 11.9% on the year to 54.9m. And again, Ken Bruce saw some falls, with his reach down 3.8% on the quarter and down 16.2% on the year to 3.3m.

Hits Radio saw some big declines with reach down 3.7% on the quarter and down 16.6% on the year to 3.9m. Hours fell 7.4% on the quarter and were down 24.5% on the year to 17.6m. I would note that these are six monthly figures, so this represents the first time that Hits Radio has reported following the end of local breakfast shows last June.

The overall Hits Radio Porfolio (exc Partners) which includes Hits and Greatest Hits branded stations saw some less steep declines, with reach down 2.8% on the quarter and down 6.5% on the year to 12.4m. Hours fell 2.8% on the quarter and were down 4.8% on the year to 105m.

Absolute Radio saw its reach down 6.3% on the quarter and down 9.3% on the year to 1.9m. Hours were down 13.4% on the quarter and down 10.6% on the year to 12.6m.

The Absolute Radio Network saw reach down 1.6% on the quarter and down 3.1% on the year to 5.4m. Hours were down 2.1% on the quarter and down 4.6% on the year to 35.9m.

Magic had mixed results with reach down 4.5% on the quarter but up 0.9% on the year to 2.3m. Hours were down just 0.1% on the quarter but up 8.2% on the year to 12.7m.

That helped Magic Network a little because it had a good quarter with reach up 4.2% on the quarter and up 3.1% on the year to 3.6m. Hours were up 8.2% on the quarter and up 14.1% on the year to 21.2m.

KISS had a decent quarter with reach up 0.4% on the quarter and up 18.7% on the year to 1.3m. Hours rose 0.5% on the quarter and were up 23.9% on the year to 5.5m.

KISSTORY remains comfortably bigger than KISS, but there were some big falls this quarter. Reach was down 18.3% on the quarter and down 20.8% on the year to 1.7m. Hours were down 27.4% on the quarter and down 19.3% on the year to 6.4m. These feel a bit like some outlier results, and I’ll be again interested to see what happens next quarter.

Podcasts & Digital

Overall listening via digital platforms is up 74.6% of all listening hours. That’s a record high, and unsurprisingly, at 25.4% AM/FM listening, analogue listening is at a record low.

Smart Speaker listening is at 14.1% this quarter which isn’t a record, but the number floats around a little, and is definitely trending upwards.

Podcast listening via this RAJAR survey is put at 16.1m people or 27.7% of the population listening to a podcast each week. That’s down a fraction from the 28.3% last quarter, but again, this is a trending upwards figure.

Elsewhere

I will be on The Media Club Podcast this week talking about all things RAJAR with Matt Deegan. The episode should be out on Friday.

Matt Deegan‘s newsletter is here
The official RAJAR site has all the topline figures
Radio Today for a digest of all the main news
Media.Info for lots of numbers and charts
The Media Leader will have analysis
BBC Mediacentre for BBC Radio stats and findings
Bauer Media’s corporate site
Global Radio’s corporate site
Radiocentre’s website

All my previous RAJAR analyses are here.

Source: RAJAR/Ipsos MORI/RSMB, period ending December 14th 2025, Adults 15+.

Disclaimer: These are my views alone and do not represent those of anyone else, including my employer. Any errors (I hope there aren’t any!) are mine alone. Drop me a note if you want clarifications on anything. Access to the RAJAR data is via RALF from DP Software as mentioned at the top of this post.